The Working Origins Timeline
Eight Markers of Workplace Success
This post briefly introduces the Working Origins timeline, or the eight ways we successfully work together.
These markers represent both biological and cultural adaptations that improved how we collaborate. Today, each of us carries the biological foundation of these adaptations—they are encoded within us. However, not all teams develop the cultural conditions needed to unlock them in the workplace.
That is the leadership challenge addressed here in Working Origins.
The Working Origins timeline is one of several models designed to provide an accessible command of our human past. The ESTIMATE acronym serves as a memory device to recall these eight markers.
Emotions, States & Drives
Our pre-human ancestors possessed the emotions, states, and drives that form the first foundation of who we are today.
Australopithecus afarensis is typical of this period roughly 3.5 million years ago, already expressed intelligence and social group behavior. These emotions, states, and drives were biologically encoded and readily produced the behaviors needed to survive in the savannah of East Africa.
Social Learning
Most experts describe Homo habilis as our first human ancestor, with clear evidence of populations in the East African savannah from 3 to 1.5 million years ago.
Ancestors such as H. habilis established an Oldowan stone-tool culture that could spread from one group to another and from one generation to the next. Associated behaviors included tool use, social learning, and group bonding through care and shame.
Trust & Trade
Homo erectus is generally associated with this period of our history, from about 1.5 million to 750 thousand years ago. Populations spread widely across Africa, Asia, and Europe.
During this time, human ancestors began transporting and exchanging goods. Associated behaviors included self-identity, empathy, and theory of mind.
Instruct with Language
From 850 to 350 thousand years ago, several populations of interrelated ancestors lived across Africa, Europe, and Asia. Here they are described simply as Archaic Homo sapiens.
This period saw the rise of several important behaviors, including the use of iconic language, longer childhood development, improved deliberation and executive control, innovation in toolmaking, and the emergence of shared identity across groups and communities.
Myth & Mediation
A number of human populations existed across Africa and Eurasia from 450 to 100 thousand years ago. In this timeline, they are described as Early Homo sapiens.
This period is marked by the controlled use of fire, the emergence of storytelling and myth, and the beginnings of belief systems.
Agile Cultures
From 90,000 to 12,000 years ago, our ancestors spread from Africa to nearly all parts of the world. This marker describes them as Diasporic Homo sapiens.
Behavioral expressions during this time included specialized group roles, exploration and creativity, planning and improved episodic memory, and the sharing of abstract ideas across groups—including concepts of future places and times.
Tilling & Tending
From roughly 15,000 to 2,500 years ago, human populations domesticated most of the plants and animals that would become the foundation of civilization.
Major changes in lifestyle and behavior included new technologies, village-based (sedentary) living, new diseases, specialized crafts, and expanded trading systems.
Education
Beginning around 3,500 years ago, the first civilizations emerged in Mesopotamia, the Nile River Valley, the Indus Valley, along the Yellow River, in Mesoamerica, and in the Andean region.
Writing was a common feature across these civilizations—if we broaden the definition to include all durable information systems. These included knotted cords, symbols, bone scripts, glyphs, and icons.
Some level of formalized education became necessary to participate in civilized society—enabling individuals to understand crafts, systems of exchange, labor roles, laws, and religious practices.